Incidents in the Night: Volume 1

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L.A. Times Book Prize Finalist (Graphic Novel/Comics) 2013

Eisner Award Nomination (Best U.S. Edition of International Material)

In Incidents in the Night David B. sets out to explore the uncharted territories of overflowing and dusty shelves of Paris' legendary book shops. His journey quickly turns into an obsessive vision quest in pursuit of a mysterious nineteenth-century journal: Incidents In the Night. Mountains of books become sites of archeological digs as the author excavates layers of myth, fact and fiction in search of the elusive thread that links them all. Along the way he stumbles on fanatical Bonapartists, occult conspiracies and the angel of death. Incidents in the Night is an intricate, ever-expanding web of dream and reality exquisitely translated by Brian Evenson.

David B. is one of France's finest cartoonists and one of the co-founders of the legendary L'Association collective. He is the author a many books: The Armed Garden and Noctural Conspiracies, among many others. Epileptic was was awarded Angoulme International Comics Festival Prize for Scenario and the Ignatz Award for Outstanding Artist.

Brian Evenson is the author of ten books of fiction. He is the winner of the International Horror Guild Award, and the American Library Association's award for Best Horror Novel. He has translated work by Christian Gailly, Jean Frmon, Claro, Jacques Jouet, Eric Chevillard, Antoine Volodine, and others. He is the recipient of three O. Henry Prizes as well as an NEA fellowship. He lives and works in Providence, Rhode Island.

Reviews

L.A. Times Book Prize Finalist (Graphic Novel/Comics) 2013 Eisner Award Nomination (Best U.S. Edition of International Material) One of 10 Best Comics and Graphic Novels of the year.TIME "Incidents in the Night immediately calls to mind postmodern works: Italo Calvinos If on a Winter's Night a Traveler, Borges's short story "The Library of Babel," and Umberto Eco's Foucaults Pendulum. Simultaneously, you are drawn into the nooks and crevices of a private detective story."World Literature Today "In its obsession with bookstores and libraries, in its nested dreams and tale-tellings, in its straight-faced conflation of history and impossibility, and in the tone of pulpy detective yarns that pervades its final third, Incidents owes more than a bit to Jorge Luis Borgess short stories."Douglas Wolk, Washington Post "Best known from Epileptic, David B.'s black-and-white art depicts unrealities and realities with equal zest, teasingly holding out a journey that's more about getting there than the destination. A treat for sophisticated adult story omnivores with a taste for bizarre mysteries."Library Journal "French cartoonist David B. turns to the wholly fantastic in this outlandishly imaginative tale of conspiracies and the occult. [...] The free-flowing, inventive visuals, boldly and confidently rendered, give the extravagant story the feel of a sustained but persuasive nightmare."Booklist "Modern French master David B. brings the same heightened sense of reality he has to past classics like Epileptic to the start of an even more fantastic talea mystery that begins, like Incidents itself, with the opening of a book. With B. himself as a participant in his Umberto Eco-esque detective tale, the narrative zooms inward and outward as history, occultism, and obsession are illustrated in episodic passages of mythic graphics and bibliophile symbolism. [...]Little of Incidents In The Night [is] made from the dull logic of the awake "Onion AV Club "[One of] the author's most personal and audacious creations. [...] influenced by classic conspiracy stories like Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49 and Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum. His character design, story flow and stark nature of the imagery are all flawless and striking."Rob Clough, High-Low Comics I dont throw words like creative and intelligent around lightly []. A reader doesnt just flip through a book that he has produced; one savors what David B. has offered the reader on each page.Sequential Highway "As is often the case (literally and figuratively), the book is much more than just a book. [Incidents in the Night] is a love letter to the power of literature; to be transporting, to illuminate history, and to grant creators a kind of textual immortality."iFanboy
L.A. Times Book Prize Finalist (Graphic Novel/Comics) 2013 Eisner Award Nomination (Best U.S. Edition of International Material) One of 10 Best Comics and Graphic Novels of the year.TIME "Incidents in the Night immediately calls to mind postmodern works: Italo Calvinos If on a Winter's Night a Traveler, Borges's short story "The Library of Babel," and Umberto Eco's Foucaults Pendulum. Simultaneously, you are drawn into the nooks and crevices of a private detective story."World Literature Today "In its obsession with bookstores and libraries, in its nested dreams and tale-tellings, in its straight-faced conflation of history and impossibility, and in the tone of pulpy detective yarns that pervades its final third, Incidents owes more than a bit to Jorge Luis Borgess short stories."Douglas Wolk, Washington Post "Best known from Epileptic, David B.'s black-and-white art depicts unrealities and realities with equal zest, teasingly holding out a journey that's more about getting there than the destination. A treat for sophisticated adult story omnivores with a taste for bizarre mysteries."Library Journal "French cartoonist David B. turns to the wholly fantastic in this outlandishly imaginative tale of conspiracies and the occult. [...] The free-flowing, inventive visuals, boldly and confidently rendered, give the extravagant story the feel of a sustained but persuasive nightmare."Booklist "Modern French master David B. brings the same heightened sense of reality he has to past classics like Epileptic to the start of an even more fantastic talea mystery that begins, like Incidents itself, with the opening of a book. With B. himself as a participant in his Umberto Eco-esque detective tale, the narrative zooms inward and outward as history, occultism, and obsession are illustrated in episodic passages of mythic graphics and bibliophile symbolism. [...]Little of Incidents In The Night [is] made from the dull logic of the awake "Onion AV Club "[One of] the author's most personal and audacious creations. [...] influenced by classic conspiracy stories like Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49 and Umberto Eco's Foucault's Pendulum. His character design, story flow and stark nature of the imagery are all flawless and striking."Rob Clough, High-Low Comics I dont throw words like creative and intelligent around lightly []. A reader doesnt just flip through a book that he has produced; one savors what David B. has offered the reader on each page.Sequential Highway "As is often the case (literally and figuratively), the book is much more than just a book. [Incidents in the Night] is a love letter to the power of literature; to be transporting, to illuminate history, and to grant creators a kind of textual immortality."iFanboy

Author Bio

David B. was born on February 9, 1959 in Nimes, France. He studied Fine Art in Paris at l'cole Duperr. His first graphic novel (comic album in France) was published in 1986 by Bayard in 1986. During this time he was a regular contributor to the magazine "Okapi et Chic" and he serialized a story in the seminal French comics magazine, "A Suivre." Since then, he has worked with virtually every major publisher in French comics. In 1990 he co-founded the important French comic publisher L'Association along with fellow cartoonists Jean-Christophe Menu, Stanislas, Mattt Konture, Killoffer and Lewis Trondheim. By 1996 what is considered David B.'s major work to date, L'Ascension du Haut Mal, was published. The story, recounting his childhood with his epileptic brother, will be published by Pantheon in early 2005 as Epileptic. BRIAN EVENSON is the author of ten books of fiction, most recently the limited edition novella Baby Leg, published by New York Tyrant Press in 2009. In 2009 he also published the novel Last Days (which won the American Library Association's award for Best Horror Novel of 2009) and the story collection Fugue State, both of which were on Time Out New York's top books of 2009. His novel The Open Curtain (Coffee House Press) was a finalist for an Edgar Award and an IHG Award. His work has been translated into French, Italian, Spanish, Japanese and Slovenian. He lives and works in Providence, Rhode Island, where he directs Brown University's Literary Arts Program. Other books include The Wavering Knife (which won the IHG Award for best story collection), Dark Property, and Altmann's Tongue. He has translated work by Christian Gailly, Jean Frmon, Claro, Jacques Jouet, Eric Chevillard, Antoine Volodine, and others. He is the recipient of three O. Henry Prizes as well as an NEA fellowship.